Catherine Maguire-Donvito · 44 min
A drama therapist reveals how giving refugee teenagers a stage to tell their own stories, from childhood laughter to war-zone terror, is quietly rewiring traumatised brains and transforming school communities across Sydney.
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Catherine Maguire-Donvito is a drama therapist who runs Treehouse Theatre, a program that helps refugee teenagers in Sydney process trauma by telling their own stories on stage. Over four months, students move from sharing happy childhood memories to narrating the events that forced them to leave home, with each story rehearsed multiple times before a live performance at the Casula Powerhouse. The repetition is deliberate: trauma memories get stuck in the emotional part of the brain until they are processed into language and performed aloud in a safe setting, which gradually rewires how young people experience those memories.
Catherine works with about 30 students a year, but since 2011 tens of thousands of high school students have watched these performances. Stories emerge with extraordinary specificity: a Syrian boy remembers rifle sighting lasers crossing his body only weeks before he performed; an Afghan girl describes wading through razor wire at Kabul airport after her brother is cut by an American soldier; a boy from Iran loses his mother in a crowd and finds her by her shoes. These are not dramatised or simplified. They are told by the young people who lived through them, with all the sensory detail intact.
What happens next matters as much as the performance itself. A Kurdish Iraqi girl whose father was thrown from a third-storey building said her nightmares stopped after she did Treehouse. A Syrian boy named Haroon who was bullied at school became a minor celebrity among his peers after telling his story. Students who enter with minimal English develop formal and colloquial fluency through script work and rehearsal. Most importantly, Catherine says, they learn this: trauma is not a mental illness. It is a normal response to extraordinary events. With time and the right support, you will recover.
“Trauma is not a mental illness. It's a normal reaction to extraordinary events and with time you will recover.”
“By telling your story multiple times in a safe setting, you are creating new cognitive networks.”
“Most do, even though there are tears, they really want people to know.”
The hero, today
Trauma memories are stored in the emotional and sensory parts of the brain and do not get processed into words until someone tells the story aloud, which is why repeated exposure to the narrative in a safe setting allows new neural pathways to form. The program teaches young refugees to see their trauma as something in the past rather than a threat in the present by having them build a coherent narrative of what happened, rehearse it multiple times, and perform it for an audience. Students who perform their stories in front of peers at their own schools often experience a shift in how they are treated by their classmates, moving from isolation or bullying to belonging and acceptance. Catherine works with about 30 adolescents a year, but because Treehouse has been performing twice yearly since 2011, tens of thousands of high school students have seen the shows and reported changed attitudes toward refugees. The program recovers trauma while building practical skills in English, confidence, commitment, and responsibility, and many former participants go on to take leadership positions in their schools or return to assist with future productions. Tell your story to someone who loves you or cares for you, because trauma is a normal reaction to extraordinary events, not a mental illness, and with time and the right support you will recover.
Yes. Catherine Maguire-Donvito is a real person who shared their own story in their own words. Kintsugi Heroes is a not-for-profit that shares first-person stories of overcoming adversity, told with the person's consent.
Kintsugi Heroes, a registered Australian not-for-profit. Every story is shared with the hero's own consent and reviewed under Kintsugi Heroes' trauma-informed content standard before it goes public.
Trauma memories are stored in the emotional and sensory parts of the brain and do not get processed into words until someone tells the story aloud, which is why repeated exposure to the narrative in a safe setting allows new neural pathways to form.
The program teaches young refugees to see their trauma as something in the past rather than a threat in the present by having them build a coherent narrative of what happened, rehearse it multiple times, and perform it for an audience.
Students who perform their stories in front of peers at their own schools often experience a shift in how they are treated by their classmates, moving from isolation or bullying to belonging and acceptance.
Emma Bellamy-Dodd (Host) · 00:14
Hello and welcome to the podcast From There to Here. I'm your host Emma Bellamy, and today my guest is Katherine McGuire Donvito. Katherine is the co-founder and director of Treehouse Theatre, an organization that's transforming the lives of refugee adolescents through the power of storytelling and theater performance. Katherine's work is all about giving young refugees the tools to reclaim their stories, process their traumas, and rebuild resilience in the face of unimaginable challenges. So whether you're curious about dramatherapy, passionate about refugee rights, or just love hearing about stories of transformation, stay tuned. This conversation will change the way you think about how refugees can overcome past traumas. Catherine Maguire-Donvito, I'm really excited to have you on the show and have you share the very unique way in which you support refugee adolescents. So let's dive right into what you do. What's the main mission of the Treehouse and what are the main components of the program?
Catherine Maguire-Donvito (Guest) · 01:40
Well, the mission is kind of twofold. One is to promote the trauma recovery of the participants, and then secondly, to inform the audiences, educate the audiences, raise consciousness in the audiences of what it means to be a refugee. Now, our audiences are high school students. We do do a one Friday night performance in which adults do come to, and it's wonderful having the adults, but they're all converted and understand, and they're a wonderful audience for our kids, very, very affirming for them. But our main goal is to promote understanding of refugees, help them to feel more welcome in their school communities and in the workplace and even in a town or— and of course in Australia as a whole, if we can get that far. Yeah.
Emma Bellamy-Dodd (Host) · 02:39
So I know that there are different components. You have the group storytelling, the performance, the psychoeducation and psychological components. Can you give us an overview of of, um, let's say I'm a student, I start the program, what's the trajectory I'm expected to have? What am I going to do over the 4 months? It's a 4-month program. Yes.
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Catherine works with about 30 adolescents a year, but because Treehouse has been performing twice yearly since 2011, tens of thousands of high school students have seen the shows and reported changed attitudes toward refugees.
This conversation includes what treehouse theatre does, four months from happy stories to the stage, the boy who couldn't find his mother, why putting trauma into words changes the brain, nightmares stop after treehouse and the australian soldier and the razor wire.
Catherine Maguire-Donvito (Guest) · 03:00
3 to 4 months. Yes. The program starts in a storytelling circle where the students learn to understand what it means to listen and to, and how to ask questions in the circle. And In the beginning, we just tell happy stories from childhood and we really try to get them to tell funny stories, little snippets of things that can just be— they generally turn out to be hilariously funny. And so we tell happy stories of home country because part of the beginning process of the first few weeks is to build that group connection and trust. And once we've got that, then we can move on into the trauma stories, but we can't go there straight away. So if they feel they're not quite there yet, we might go into the stories of happy stories of life in Australia. And then we then go into the trauma stories. And when we do the trauma stories, we sort of set it up so that it's a really special experience. We light candles, we put flowers, a few little symbols in the centre of the circle. And we ask the students to tell us what were the reasons that caused them to leave their country, why did they have to leave. And then from there, it probably takes 3 to 4 weeks. We rehearse every Sunday and to get through the trauma stories. With the happy stories, we tend to improvise those on the spot. So they're building their acting skills and building their connections with each other and they're usually really hilarious. Like, for example, one boy was watching a film in English and he was only little and he said to his mum, "Why— what are they talking— what are they doing? I can't understand them." And she said, the mum said, "Oh, they're speaking English and that's another language." And then this boy, his name was Akhil, he paused for a moment and he said, "Ah, but they laugh in Arabic." And so we just have these little stories that really seem like nothing almost when they're being told, but with a bit of creative staging and the kids themselves love it. And so there's a lot of laughing, a lot of joy in those first few weeks going through the scrapes, mishaps, when they were naughty, when they got lost. Like, there was one story about this— I think the boy was living in Iran at the time, and all the women wear burkas— and he lost his mum, and he didn't know which one was his mum. And then eventually he was walking with this woman, and this woman said, 'Who are you?' You know, and then he realised, 'You're not my mum.' And then he realised he'd lost his mum. So he was looking around frantically. Can't remember how he actually found them. But how he got to recognise her was by her shoes. And we did that to— we had the burqas all on high sticks so that the burqas would be tall, should be the mothers, and long black drapes right down to the ground. And we had about, I don't know, the whole cast except for the little boy buzzing around to the dance of the bumblebee. And it was, you know, just really cute. So we do a lot of things like that. Or when I went shopping with my mum and she left me, she forgot to bring me home. She did all the shopping, got home and said, I've got the grapes, I've got the bread, I've got this and that, the ribbons and the balloons. And she was saying, "I'm sure I've forgotten something." And then we cut back to this little girl in the shopping centre, "Where's my mum? She's left me." And then eventually a cousin actually just happens to come by and brings her home. And mum hadn't even really missed her, she reckons. Anyway, just lots of funny stories like that which help to build that sense of connection and trust and safety We like it to be a playful environment if possible, but then when we do get to the script writing stage— so we've got storytelling and improvisation and we stage it and then write those into scripts using whatever words and staging the kids had themselves. Then when we move on into the trauma stories, we prepare them for that with quite a bit of psychoeducational material about the sorts of things that you can feel or what might happen when you have experienced horrific events where you think yourself or someone you know might die, and a little bit about what trauma is, a little bit about flashbacks and nightmares and things like that. It kind of comes up incidentally. It's not kind of like a lecture, but we do sort of provide that, teach them a little bit about breathing, how to bring their anxiety down if it's creeping up or if they're getting overwhelmed. We insist that no one leaves the circle, but we allow each person to go and give anyone a hug if they want to. And there's a lot of tears. Some kids don't tell their stories. Most do. Even though there are tears, they really want people to know. And from there, we write those scripts because it's too traumatic to improvise a trauma script. And while we're writing the scripts, we add in— and even with the improvised ones, we add in sound effects and music, you know, whatever we feel will complement the piece. So we write the scripts and then there's a bit of to and froing with the kid who will say, "No, that didn't happen like that." You know, "It's wrong." And then we'll correct it They might show it to their parents. They read it again. And then after a couple of weeks, they're happy with the story. And then we'll start staging it or blocking it. Blocking means where you tell people what you're going to say, where you're going to say it, and how you're going to say it on the stage. We teach them about downstage, upstage, prompt or opposite prompt. All of those sorts of things. We teach them about how you have to sort of stand— you can't talk with your back to the audience. That's always a big one. 'cause they're not gonna hear you or see your face. So we teach a lot of drama skills, acting skills incidentally along the way. And when we've got all the stories down and we're happy with them, then we move into the rehearsal time. And we will pick about 25 vignettes. We usually have many more stories, but we can't do all of them. So we always do the trauma stories, but We try to limit it to 2 pieces per child because when we've got 13 or 14 kids, that's a show and we can't go on for too long. And then we usually have some sort of opening piece which we rehearse together, usually a movement piece or something with a nice piece of poetry that's relevant or poignant. So that's kind of like what a child would be doing. And what they would expect to do and then they go to performance. At Kasiula Powerhouse, we're doing 6 performances, 2 on a Saturday and we get their parents to come and see it on the Saturday. The interesting thing is with parents, oftentimes when the whole family has experienced a traumatic event together, they tend not to talk about it. They tend to think, "Oh, we all know what happened." And so oftentimes when they speak in our Story Circle, they're telling the story for the first time. There are of course other families who just talk and talk and talk about it all the time because that's their way, but we'll often find that kids have never actually put their story into words and that can be very challenging for them.
Emma Bellamy-Dodd (Host) · 11:22
And tell me about what is it in the program that is helping them overcome the effects of trauma. To be a little bit more technical about what is it that provokes the change in them.
Catherine Maguire-Donvito (Guest) · 11:36
Well, it's telling the story. Because trauma memories are stored in the emotional part of the brain, in the limbic system, and they're not processed into words. They're not something that has been processed so that they can think about it in words in the cognitive part of the brain, in the neocortex. Okay. It's all stored in the emotional and sensory parts of the brain, waiting to get triggered by some stimulus like a sound or a smell, helicopters, big loud noise, ready to get triggered into overwhelming sense of fear. Maybe a flashback. It may bubble up in nightmares. Because those memories haven't been processed. And what our process does is initially by telling the story to our little circle is the first kind of exposure, if you like, to the story, putting it into words, which is what counselling does. You know, when you go to see a counsellor, you often think, I'm really sad, I'm really upset, but I don't know what it is, and it takes a little time to actually get to the point where you can actually put it into words. And once you put it into words, that's usually the benefit of counselling. And such with this. So in the first Story Circle, telling the trauma story for the first time is the first exposure. To use a narrative therapy term, it's kind of like insider witness. The other students are witnessing the first testimony of the person who has experienced the trauma or the trauma survivor. And then there's that toing and froing where the kids eventually realise that they've left bits out. Now, one of the ways to recover from trauma is to be able to build a coherent narrative about what happened. And so our process provides for that. So that during this time when the script is going backwards and forwards, they're saying, "Oh, but this happened first and then that." And I remember the sound of the glass breaking through the window. And there was this sound, you know, and I felt it through my feet, the vibration. And so we add in all these little details which make it real for the audiences, but also for the kids so that they process it. So then again, when they rehearse the story and will probably— each piece is probably rehearsed 5 or 6 times at least, that is kind of like repeated exposure to the traumatic event. And so during that time, they realise that when they think about these terrible things, they can manage their feelings. They're not overtaken by overwhelming grief and fear so that they're out of control. So that's what I meant by repeated exposure. Our sound effects are quite realistic. Sounds of bombs, sounds of sirens. We obviously don't have the smells because they're pretty poignant actually. And we will also show video footage if they've got it. Like last year we had this boy from Myanmar and we showed video footage—he took it actually—of when the militia came into his home to try and kidnap people, to take people. So the aim is to build a cohesive narrative but at the same time exposure to the event and realistic exposure—sort of controlled exposure, I suppose, would be a better way of of saying it.
Emma Bellamy-Dodd (Host) · 15:38
Yeah. So it's about recounting the traumatic events, the traumatic memories, but in a safe setting. And by telling your story multiple times in a safe setting, you are creating new cognitive networks.
Catherine Maguire-Donvito (Guest) · 15:56
Yeah, but you're building new neural pathways and you can actually see it happen. Mm-hmm. You know? And I asked a few kids about 2 or 3 years later— I'd asked them after the show too, but I said, "When did your nightmares stop?" For example, this girl, an Iraqi girl, Kurdish, half Kurdish, her father was thrown out of a third-story building and other horrific things. And she said, "Oh, after I did Treehouse." Wow. So, you know, pretty powerful actually.
Emma Bellamy-Dodd (Host) · 16:29
Yeah. Yeah. Basically, the program gives you the ability to see your trauma as a story, as something in the past and not something that is currently threatening. That's right.
Catherine Maguire-Donvito (Guest) · 16:43
It's almost like you are observing your story from a different perspective. And that's why we call it Narrative Exposure Therapy. I can give you the reference for the paper that I based it on. It's really nice. I use it in counseling as well.
Emma Bellamy-Dodd (Host) · 17:00
But what I really like is when you experience trauma, you are constantly reliving the past in the present. And so your job is to put it back in the past. Exactly. Exactly. In a nutshell. Hmm. That's, that's pretty powerful. And so do you have any performances perhaps the most memorable performances that you've done throughout your career that you could perhaps give us an overview of?
Catherine Maguire-Donvito (Guest) · 17:31
Hey, look, I might just tell you one of the more recent ones. Yeah, Nouria is an Afghan girl who came to Australia as an unaccompanied minor during the fall of Afghanistan, and there's a whole lot more to her story, but a bit that really struck home to me was that they were waiting to get onto the plane, or waiting to get to be on a plane at the airport at Kabul, and there was this filthy culvert. And I'm really— we really can't work out what it is, whether it was sewage, but it was disgusting and smelly, and there was all razor wire in it. And to get to this gate, they had to wade through it. She was there with her little brother who was, I think, about 10 at the time, and she was about 14, 15, something like that. And she sat her little brother on the concrete wall so that he could have a rest and not be standing in the water. And this American soldier put his foot in the back of the little boy and pushed him into the water onto the razor wire, so he was very cut and very bleeding. And an Australian soldier saw what happened, and she didn't understand what he said because she didn't know any English at that point, but she gathered it was something like, "What do you think you're doing?" You know, "Don't do that," or something like that. And then the Australian soldier said, "Where are you going?" She was actually an orphan but living with a family that she was sort of working and helping for. Because her parents were killed in a house fire when she was 6 and the little brother was 3. So they'd been running around the countryside as orphans trying to sort of survive. So she's got major stories, this kid. I think you might like to interview her, actually. I was going to recommend her for you to interview. And so the Australian soldier said, where are you going? And the woman that was with her said, say Australia, say Australia, because her husband came a year as a boat arrival and was in Australia, and she was joining him. And, uh, and so she said Australia. And so she got on the, the plane, and that girl was at the airport with no papers. She is the sort of kid that just thinks, I want this and I'm going to make it happen. Now people would say, well, you can't do that, you don't have any papers. She said, I'll go there anyway. Wow. So So that's one that really, really stands out. And another one I might tell you about too. A boy, a Syrian boy actually, was captured by, I think it was Kurds actually, it was a Kurdish militia in Syria during the Syrian civil war. And they took his father. And so he and his brother and his mum didn't know whether his dad was going to come back. And Haroon told this story in bits. It was very fragmented, his memory of it, which is normal with a trauma story. And at the end, about a couple of weeks before we were about to perform, he said, "I remember. I remember the rifle sighting lasers going around the bus and across my body." you know, and feeling, you know, so terrified that, you know, he could be hit, that he could be shot. And that was a memory that emerged during our process as an example.
Emma Bellamy-Dodd (Host) · 21:10
A post-traumatic memory.
Catherine Maguire-Donvito (Guest) · 21:12
Yes, yes, yes. So, so many. And then another story of a brother and sister, Karifa and Mariama, rebels shot. They wanted their father to do something, or rather probably join them, and he was shot. And then they made— no, no, take it back. They shot the mother. They shot the mother, and then they made him dig a grave for her, and the children watched this. That was from Liberia. And I guess another one that— one of the very first stories we had that's always— I always think about is they were a Congolese family and the rebels came to the front door and while the father was talking to the rebels at the front door, he said, "Go, go, go, go, go," and the rest of the family ran out the back. Father was killed. And they was— they were saved. And we called that piece My Father's Gift. Wow.
Emma Bellamy-Dodd (Host) · 22:20
And so when you have a performance, you have multiple stories that are displayed as a performance, or is it focusing on one story per performance?
Catherine Maguire-Donvito (Guest) · 22:30
We focus— we do those individual vignettes, okay, probably 3 to 5 minutes each. Sometimes they're a bit longer. We'll do some ensemble pieces as as well for a bridge, you know, like for maybe sort of the plane journey over. We might do that as a little performance piece or something like that. And we might do sort of something at the end like a finale or an opening piece that sort of sets a theme for the whole piece. Our next show is going to be called Escape from War. We give each show a different name because we used to call it all Tree of Life, actually, which was actually the name of the program, an art therapy program that I based it on. Ground stories are stories about the now. The leaves are the people who love and support us, and then the fallen leaves are the people who have died, and then the branches are the hopes and dreams for the future. And then we do the trauma stories where, because even when a tree is in a forest or, you know, it can be attacked by flood or fire or whatever. And, and of course, only the most resilient ones survive. And the kids that we have here are the survivors. So we used to always call it Tree of Life, but then everybody thought it was the same show even though we have different cast every time. So we decided to give it a different name every time. Okay. The, the reference for that one is actually Nkubi, and it's called the Tree of Life Project, which It was a project that was developed in South Africa, Johannesburg actually. And it was actually an art project, an art therapy project. But I thought this would make a really nice framework for a theater project. So that's kind of how it came about in the beginning.
Emma Bellamy-Dodd (Host) · 24:19
I always ask my guests to recommend a book, a movie, or a show to the audience. But I guess given that you are producing shows, Tell me, what is the showpiece that you would recommend them to see?
Catherine Maguire-Donvito (Guest) · 24:32
Well, of course, Escape from War. Yeah. Coming up at Kassula Powerhouse Centre in Refugee Week. And given that our intended audiences are actually high school students, it really fits in nicely as a really good activity for Refugee Week for schools. So if there's any teachers out there you want to do something for Refugee Week, ours is a brilliant event and Casula Powerhouse is a wonderful venue. It's in Liverpool and where there's a very high migrant population and the theatre itself, its mission is to build audiences amongst our migrant and refugee communities. For some of our kids, they— the first time they walk into the performance space, who've never been in a theatre before. Wow. And of course their parents may not have either, you know. So I remember one African boy saying, "What is this place?" And we explained that this is a place for telling stories. I couldn't think of— and he said, "Wow, you have a place like this just for telling stories?" You know. That's so cute. It's a delightful privilege to be able to work with these kids because you see things afresh through different eyes and you learn so much.
Emma Bellamy-Dodd (Host) · 25:58
Do you have any word of wisdom for young refugees who have experienced traumatic events and may be struggling with mental health issues?
Catherine Maguire-Donvito (Guest) · 26:08
Tell your story to someone who cares. Someone who loves you, preferably, your friends, your counselor, and tell your story. And it's okay. Trauma is not a mental illness. It's a normal reaction to extraordinary events. And with time, you will recover.
Emma Bellamy-Dodd (Host) · 26:35
I feel that whenever you have experienced a traumatic event, telling it the first time makes you relive it. It can be tough to do, but— Yes. So your advice would be that if you share more and more about it in a safe environment with people who care for you, then your neural pathways are going to evolve with that interaction.
Catherine Maguire-Donvito (Guest) · 26:58
Yes, yes, that's exactly right.
Emma Bellamy-Dodd (Host) · 27:02
So I have two questions that I love to ask my guests at the end of the interview. And the first one is, when I say the word refugee, what does it evoke for you?
Catherine Maguire-Donvito (Guest) · 27:19
Grief, loss, war, incredible rejection, loss of self, loss of who you are. Loss of purpose. And I suppose even a little further than that, I despair a bit about the world that we keep on creating refugees. And then often the countries that create the refugees don't want to take them. They're very negative and racist when the refugees actually come, even though we probably helped to create them, like with Iraq, for example. And it's become so politicised. And that I find really sad. And I suppose at the age I am now, I thought it might get better. You know, when I was younger, I thought, oh, you know, we can fix this, you know. But it's not. It's gotten worse. I can't see it ever changing really. And all we can do is to do our best in our little corner of the world. I mean, we work with about 30 kids a year, which is not much. It's just a drop in the ocean.
Emma Bellamy-Dodd (Host) · 28:39
Yeah, but it's still an impact on 30 lives, you know.
Catherine Maguire-Donvito (Guest) · 28:43
It still matters. And it's an impact on the audiences as well. And I would love it if a school and this hasn't happened yet, but if a school could commit to sending a year group every year so that every child in that school has exposure to Treehouse Stories, to refugee stories, so that they can understand and be more welcoming. Like that boy that I was talking to you about, Haroon, with the sniper laser thing, he was bullied terribly. He was quite clever, a little bit awkward in the way he presented himself sometimes. And so he was bullied terribly, but after he told his story in his own school, he became a minor celebrity. Wow. Everybody wanted to be his friends and the bullying stopped. And in fact, one of the things that happens in the early days when Facebook was still new, you know, they'd say, oh, you know, I made 60 new Facebook friends after the show and that sort of thing.
Emma Bellamy-Dodd (Host) · 29:46
That's life-changing for a kid that age, you know, like I think being rejected is so painful, particularly when you add that to traumatic events that you have to deal with. So to have other people see your story, I think—
Catherine Maguire-Donvito (Guest) · 30:03
And for them to be proud of their story, to come out as a refugee, that's a real thing. Most— many of them hide it. They don't disclose that they're a refugee because they— I mean, I've had neighbors say to me, 'Are refugees a real thing or is it all made up?' What? Yeah, Liberal voters who live next door. 'Is it a real thing?' And, you know, I said, 'Well, yes, yes it is. Come and see the show.' But there is so much negativity and this idea that they're only here for economic reasons, for a better life, that it's all made up. And that's a really common perception out there.
Emma Bellamy-Dodd (Host) · 30:50
Have they changed their mind after they watched the show?
Catherine Maguire-Donvito (Guest) · 30:53
I don't know. They never come.
Emma Bellamy-Dodd (Host) · 30:56
I hope they have. My gosh. And I usually ask as well a question that revolves around identity and how refugees or immigrants navigate between multiple identities and their Australian identities, and whether they feel like they are Australian. But because you are a professional, I think a better question would be, what do you think we can do to help refugees feel more valued and included within Australian society so that they feel like they truly belong long here?
Catherine Maguire-Donvito (Guest) · 31:30
Well, one is to do more activities like Treehouse. Yeah. And just, I don't know, it sounds a bit twee, but to show respect, to value them, to be interested in their story, where they've come from. Yeah, curiosity. Yeah, yeah, sort of real, real genuine curiosity, interest. And see them as more than just a refugee, you know, they're a whole person. They're really amazing because they are survivors.
Emma Bellamy-Dodd (Host) · 32:03
I think one of the most powerful things about having their story being told is that it humanizes them for the audience. They get to humanize and put faces on the label or status refugee that is highly politicized, as you said. So it it makes them feel empathy.
Catherine Maguire-Donvito (Guest) · 32:26
Yeah. Well, that's also one of the dramatic benefits of using the happy childhood stories because, like, knocking on doors and running away, that's a really common story and it's universal. All kids seem to do— have done something like that. I didn't, but most of the other people I know I did, you know, did. So there's lots of stories about getting in trouble and the audiences who are high school audiences, they identify and they realise that they are people just like them. And then we always survey the audiences and universally students will say, "I didn't realise how lucky I was." They didn't know things like, "I thought only Black people were refugees." Lots of little comments like this that come through from our surveys because we ask them if it's changed the way they think about refugees. We only— we see 30, maybe 35 students a year, but 40,000 or 50,000 high school students have seen our shows. So perhaps because we've been doing it since 2011 and 2 shows a year since 2011. Hopefully that has made an impact on the young people.
Emma Bellamy-Dodd (Host) · 33:45
I really hope as well that this is a program that is going to gain traction across Australia. And, you know, I feel that the art therapies and drama therapy is really undervalued and underexplored for trauma recovery. And I really hope that there are going to be more organizations like yours that are going to initiate that kind of programs to help other people like refugees and immigrants because that is so impactful?
Catherine Maguire-Donvito (Guest) · 34:16
As far as I know, I think we're the only ones doing it. And from a theatrical point of view, there are quite a few dramaturges that will take 3 or 4 refugee stories and blend them into one play. And but the problem with that is you're never quite sure which bit of the story happened to which person and whether they were okay afterwards. Whereas ours, we see some of their journey throughout the performance and we know that they're okay at the end, you know, because they're there and they say so.
Emma Bellamy-Dodd (Host) · 34:53
Yeah, and I like as well the fact that you have a follow-up, you have a survey for the audience that watches the performance, but as well you kind of like reach out to them after the performance and see how they are doing, how are they feeling. And I think the psychological component of the program is really meaningful there. Yeah, yeah. So if I am a student and I want to participate in the program, what, what should I do?
Catherine Maguire-Donvito (Guest) · 35:22
Well, At the moment, our main way of recruiting students are students that attend the particular schools where we work. For example, we're working at Miller Technology High School, who I must say as a school has provided us phenomenal support since 2011, and those will be the major part of the students. However, we had some students from Liverpool Girls High School after the show last year who said, 'Can they be in it?' And I said, 'Of course, but you do have to come to rehearsals on a Sunday,' you know.
Emma Bellamy-Dodd (Host) · 35:56
Okay.
Catherine Maguire-Donvito (Guest) · 35:57
So it's a big commitment. And that's something else that it teaches them, I suppose, is commitment and responsibility for themselves and for others, being part of a team. A lot of our kids go on to take on leadership positions in the schools. So many of our kids have been school captain or at least on the prefect team, the school leadership team. The other school, Holroyd High School, where we also work, they don't— I should say that both these schools have intensive English centres. An intensive English centre in Australia is where newly arrived migrant and refugee students come for around about a year to learn English before they go into to the mainstream. And so Miller is— has an IEC and so does Holroyd. And I used to be employed as the school counsellor for the IEC and I've always worked mainly with the refugee kids. But at Holroyd, many of those kids exit to different high schools, like Granville Boys, Phillip High School, Parramatta High. Chifley College, and they come in to rehearsals on a Sunday even though they're attending other schools. But basically, we don't audition or anything like that. If you want to be in it, you're in it. We tell them what it's about so that if the idea of performing absolutely freaks them out, then they're probably not the right person for the program. But then we tell them that you'll develop incredible confidence, self-confidence. Confidence, which they do. They go from hardly being able to tell their story in the little circle to performing at Seymour Centre. It's about 500-member audiences and things like that. So we tell them, yeah, it's a bit hard, it's a bit scary, but it will be life-changing and you will learn all these skills.
Emma Bellamy-Dodd (Host) · 37:50
What if they think that their English is not good enough? What's the position on this?
Catherine Maguire-Donvito (Guest) · 37:55
All of their English is not good enough. We take them after maybe only a year in Australia. So that's another great outcome of our program is that they're exposed to English with an ESL teacher, EALD now they call it, and they get about an extra goodness knows how many extra hours exposure to English. 'Cause when they're at home they don't speak English and when they're with their friends they don't tend to speak English because in the IEC there'll be a lot of kids from Iraq Iraq and Syria and whatever, and so they're only speaking English in the classroom or very sort of colloquial English with their friends in the playground. So when they do the program with us, their English, formal English as well as their colloquial English, goes through the roof. When we've done sort of qualitative feedback forms and asked them, you know, how much has their English improved? You know, not at all, a little bit, or heaps. They'll say heaps. Or put it on a Likert scale. They'll give themselves 10 out of 10 for improvement in English. And of course we make a script. It's got every story in there and they have to learn their lines and they have to read it. Okay, so they're getting that sort of exposure to— immersed in the literacy of it as well.
Emma Bellamy-Dodd (Host) · 39:15
And they have to articulate, they have to have the pronunciation right. So it's like a fantastic exercise for the English. It is. You know, even if it's so much more than that.
Catherine Maguire-Donvito (Guest) · 39:24
It's quite an experiential learning process, which is the best way to learn anything. And it's really purposeful for them. And one thing I should say, and I haven't sort of laboured this, but a woman called Judith Herman sort of came up with 4 recovery goals. Goals. And she's one of the people in America that really first started to make a really strong case that PTSD is a thing, you know, because it only came about after the Vietnam vets, you know, that came back as it came out as a diagnosis. And the main ways to recover, the trauma recovery goals, are to establish safety first of all, physical safety, you know, to know that you're not going to be bombed minute. Trust and psychological safety, that's kind of a sense of belonging, which we do. We become like a family. We become really close. And kids will ring me or Ruth up years later and with a question, or someone will say, can I see you for some counselling or something like that, which I always give free of charge to former Treehouse kids. And then the other one is to have a sense of purpose and to tell this story. It isn't just going to counselling for the sake of counselling, which a lot of people find hard. It's got a purpose and it's sort of not just about you, it's about telling your story to others. And then almost they can almost be like somebody else. It's almost like when they're acting, it's like a mask, and so it becomes really out there. And so they can look at what happens from a whole different perspective.
Emma Bellamy-Dodd (Host) · 41:08
Yeah. And telling your story is useful in so many other contexts. You know, it's useful in the workplace. It's useful in whenever you connect with new people. So it's not only a thing that you learn to do for a theater performance, it's something that you're going to be able to use in your life.
Catherine Maguire-Donvito (Guest) · 41:28
Absolutely. Yeah, absolutely. I mean, one of our girls was doing drama and she wrote a script for one of her assessment things and it was about other students in the class, but she'd used the same sort of format and framework that we used and it was so lovely to see that develop. And she's actually going to come back and assist with the next production. Which is really nice.
Emma Bellamy-Dodd (Host) · 41:55
Ah, so as well, previous students can come back and help in another way.
Catherine Maguire-Donvito (Guest) · 42:00
Yes, they want to. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I mean, for some, they've told their story, they've done it. Not that many are really interested in acting, you know, that you'd think so because some of them are really brilliant. But I have to say, I think that's a bit down to the direction and the way we set it, you know, so that it really shows them off. I think I had one that did drama at Wollongong and he's trying to get work as a director now. And this girl might be interested in doing more work with drama. Most don't do, don't follow it up at all. It's almost like a rite of passage, if you like, for them to tell their story.
Emma Bellamy-Dodd (Host) · 42:40
And so for people like me who would love to attend one of the performances, What they need to do is go on the website?
Catherine Maguire-Donvito (Guest) · 42:49
Yeah, tickets are up for sale at Kasiula Powerhouse now. And if you put in Treehouse Theatre, it should come up, or Escape from War should come up.
Emma Bellamy-Dodd (Host) · 43:00
Well, Catherine, thank you so much for sharing the work that you do. It's so meaningful. I fell in love with the Treehouse project as soon as I heard about it and I can't wait to see it grow and see many other people attend the performances, many other students becoming actors of their stories. And thank you for being here.
Catherine Maguire-Donvito (Guest) · 43:24
Yeah, thank you. And thank you for your very intelligent and astute questions. You made it very easy. Thank you.
Emma Bellamy-Dodd (Host) · 43:32
Thank you about that. Thank you for listening to the show. I hope you enjoyed my conversation with Catherine and all the insights she has shared. If you did and want to help the show grow, make sure you follow us and show us some love with likes and stars in the ratings. Your support helps more than I can say. Next week, I will be interviewing Maryam Zahid, an Afghan refugee who will share what it means to lose your childhood overnight, the traumas of war, and the challenges of resettling in a new country. Maryam is on a mission to empower Afghan women and challenge misconceptions about refugees. So stay tuned. I was your host, Emma Bellamy, and I cannot wait to bring you on another journey from there to here.
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